The 'Beast' awaits Nuggets in a love-to-hate-'em blood feud with T-Wolves | Mark Kiszla

The Nuggets' road to a repeat has morphed into a high-wire act led by a hero hobbling on one leg.

While this might be a weird way to go about building an NBA dynasty, it’s certainly wild and crazy fun — provided, of course, that your heart can stand the danger.

Late Monday night, after guard Jamal Murray stuck a final dagger in the Lakers’ heart during a 108-106 victory that gave us all palpitations, Nuggets president Josh Kroenke shook my hand in a Denver locker room where players sat and chatted like a band of happy brothers, in absolutely no hurry to shower and go home.

“These guys,” confessed Kroenke, grinning like a man fighting to regain his equilibrium after stumbling off a roller-coaster ride, “are going to kill me one of these days.”

Buckle up, buttercup.

The Nuggets’ degree of difficulty to repeat as league champs takes a steep climb up the high wire from here.

With the grand old guard of LeBron James, Steph Curry and Kevin Durant unceremoniously dumped from the playoffs before the first day of May, the upcoming series between Denver and Minnesota is going to be the basketball war NBA fans didn’t know they needed.

Remember how the Avalanche and Red Wings were a blood feud back in the day? An honest-to-goodness, bad-to-the-bone rival, a full basketball equal unlike any team the Nuggets have ever truly loved to hate, awaits in the Timberwolves.

“A beast,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said.

He’s not kidding. I strongly suspect Malone knows no team this side of Boston (and maybe not even the Celtics) poses a greater threat to Denver’s title defense than the T-Pups.

After winning 12 of 13 games against James and Anthony Davis, the Nuggets are indeed their daddy. Minny and Denver? This is gonna be a whole ’nuther story. We’re talking about a family feud born of such intense familiarity between the two franchises that, by comparison, makes the Hatfields and McCoys a family picnic.

Tim Connelly drafted Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, who now do pick ’n’ roll on the court the way Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey did dance on the silver screen, then took the money and ran to Minneapolis, building the Timberwolves in the Nuggets’ image.

While folks will call me crazy, and this prediction will drive Massholes mad, the winner of Denver and Minnesota should instantly be declared the favorite to win the NBA Finals.

Game 1 is Saturday at Ball Arena. I can’t wait. And Jokic would like to add: Ditto.

“If you ask me, I would like to play Minnesota in two or three days,” said Jokic, whose daydreams wander back to Serbia when there’s not another game immediately in front of him. “I don’t like five days off. My body thinks it’s a rest.”

Joker, who treats his basketball mates like family, relishes the chance to play the Timberwolves, because he loves Connelly like a brother and still texts Minnesota staffers who formerly worked in Denver.

But also count on his inner Felonious Gru to appear for all the basketball universe to see, because I’m not sure if there’s another foe on the planet that Jokic enjoys using his magic to mess with more than T-Wolves center Rudy Gobert, the league’s nearly perennial defensive player of the year.

“We can’t give them life,” said Murray, turning his attention to Minnesota after celebrating another legendary playoff shot worthy of champagne by putting his aching left calf on ice.

Murray grew up in Canada wanting to be like LeBron James, then eliminated the King and his yellow-clad minions from the playoffs with fourth-quarter heroics in a series Denver rarely led except when it mattered most.

At 39 years old, Bron is a freak of nature whose performance against the Nuggets again stated his case against Michael Jordan and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar for GOAT status.

At the tender age of 22, however, Timberwolves star Anthony Edwards is the next great one. I’m here to tell you in the not-too-distant future, Ant-Man is more likely to take the MVP mantle away from Jokic than either Luka Doncic or Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

“He’s a bad boy,” said Aaron Gordon, giving Edwards his flowers.

The problem with Ant for the Nuggets, whose championship bona fides are built in no small measure of wicked perimeter defense? Edwards might be a wee bit too strong for Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and a tad too quick for Gordon.

“Don’t gamble too much. Stay in front of him. Contest everything,” said Caldwell-Pope, giving a peek at the strategy against Edwards. “Contest everything for 48 minutes a night and I think we’ll be able to hold him down.”

Good luck, my friend. The Nuggets got by King James on his way down. Holding off Ant-Man’s ascension might well be tougher.

While there figure to be 100 threads to pull from a series between two franchises whose histories are already so delightfully tangled, let’s get down to the real nitty gritty.

Top to bottom, the Timberwolves are a better basketball team than Denver.

But in the clutch, the NBA has never seen a better two-man game than Joker and Jamal.